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Lance and Rodney team up to navigate the rapids of the Nantahala River in western North Carolina
Finding Joy in Our Differences: Not As Crazy as It Sounds
May 11, 2025
It's no secret that most of us in America find ourselves in a wildly different place these days.
It's a place that some of us might say we barely recognize. I wish I could describe it as being a happier place, but instead, it's a place that seems to have more anxiety, fear, anger, intolerance, and even hatred. It's a place where dialogue is often avoided for fear of igniting a firestorm of controversy. And it's a place where many of us would say that joyfulness is becoming harder and harder to find. It's not surprising, then, that we find ourselves immersed in this unprecedented "epidemic of loneliness."
Off and on, for more than a few years now, I've been tempted to feel like a victim of these challenging forces. And as much as I want to help make America a happier, healthier place for all of us, sometimes I've been deeply worried, depressed, even overwhelmed by the immense amount of hard work it seems to take just to keep my own head on straight, let alone the other 340 million of us.
But then I saw a miracle.
Not a miracle in the theological sense. But every bit as powerful in terms of reshaping my thinking on the polarization challenge that we're all facing.
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Last summer, I had the good fortune of being in western North Carolina for one of Team Democracy's R.A.F.T. (Reuniting America by Fostering Trust) events. What caught my eye were two ordinary Americans, one from the far left, and one from the far right, who were paired up in a raft for an excursion down the Nantahala River where they - and other pairs like them - would play together and work together to tackle the challenges in front of them.
CBS and other film crews were on hand to see what would happen. As CBS correspondent Major Garrett later confided, "I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it myself."
- YouTubewww.youtube.com
What he and I both saw were two of the most diametrically opposite people imaginable: Rodney Sadler, a black, progressive, southern minister, who was paired up with Lance Moseley, a white, conservative Trump supporter.
This couldn't possibly end well.
Before the trip, Lance and Rodney sat side by side for an interview with Major Garrett. It was awkward. They agreed on nothing. And they leaned about as far away from each other as they could.
Five hours later, they were back in those same two chairs, this time leaning toward each other, laughing, joking, and ending the interview with a heartfelt embrace and a shared "Love ya, brother!"
Lance and Rodney's differences were still there—all of them. But in the few playful hours they shared on the river, they discovered genuine joy in connecting with each other's humanity and in being open enough to hear and respect each other's experiences, personal stories, and ideas.
All of us on that trip were inspired by what we saw.
It reminded me of when Becca Kearl, Executive Director of one of the country's leading practitioners promoting the importance of cross-partisan dialogue - (Living Room Conversations) - described how, in the right circumstances (open mind, open heart and genuine curiosity about others' perspectives) reaching out across our differences doesn't need to be difficult or intimidating, but can actually be joyful, liberating, and fulfilling.
It reminded me of when Karissa Raskin, Executive Director of a project that helps align the work of more than 500 nonprofit organizations that are bringing Americans together across divides (Listen First Project) described "shared play experiences" as being a joyful and powerful pathway to deeper connections.
And it reminded me of my own experience with the Unify Challenge, an extraordinary platform offered by Unify America, where anyone can start to dabble with the idea of connecting, in a safe way and in a safe place, with someone outside their bubble. In my case, I was paired up with a college student who was 50 years my junior, and my political opposite, for a 90-minute conversation about 14 of the thorniest topics Americans are struggling with. At the end, we couldn't pull ourselves away from the call because we were finding so much enjoyment in sharing and understanding our differences.
Lance and Rodney have modeled for us something that is at the same time miraculous and universal - something that lives in each of us already; something that doesn't fade away, but has lasting power and impact.
Now, half a year later, Lance and Rodney are the best of friends. They talk. They collaborate. They will soon help launch Team Democracy's Reuniting America Podcast - a safe place where wildly different points of view can be aired in a healthy atmosphere that's filled with intellectual curiosity.
Lance and Rodney showcase something that each of us is capable of emulating. We would all do well to lean in, learn from them, and follow their inspiring example.
For more information about their journey, or to participate in, partner with, or sponsor a RAFT for America event this year, or to submit a request to be a guest on the soon-to-launch Reuniting America Podcast, contact ken.powley@teamdemocracy.org
Ken Powley is CEO and co-founder of Team Democracy. Powley lives in Mountain Top, PA. He retired from a 46-year career at the helm of his whitewater rafting company, to found Team Democracy with his brother-in-law Chris.
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U.S. Capitol Building, Thursday, May 8, 2025
Credit: Erin Drumm
Winning the Global AI Race: Senators Discuss Ensuring US Dominance
May 10, 2025
WASHINGTON—On Thursday, senators from the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation discussed the need to accelerate U.S. artificial intelligence innovation to maintain global leadership in AI development.
“The United States leads today, but what I would like to say is, it is a race. Leadership is absolutely not guaranteed.” Dr. Lisa Su, CEO and Chair of Advanced Micro Devices, said.
According to the 2024 Stanford AI Index, the United States currently ranks first in quantity and quality of AI models, but China has been closing the quality gap.
At a hearing Thursday, titled “Winning the AI Race: Strengthening U.S. capabilities in Computing and Innovation,” members of Congress and witnesses discussed the importance of American investment in AI development globally to preserve U.S. dominance.
“This future can be almost unimaginably bright, but only if we take concrete steps to ensure that an American-led version of AI, built on democratic values like freedom and transparency,
prevails over an authoritarian one,” Sam Altman, CEO and co-founder of OpenAI, said in his testimony.
OpenAI is a leading American artificial intelligence company and the developer of ChatGPT, a free online chatbot. OpenAI launched OpenAI for Countries on Wednesday to help grow global AI adoption using OpenAI’s tech as the foundation.
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Chinese AI firm DeepSeek shook the tech world when it launched its new AI model in January. It claimed that its AI model performs as well as OpenAI while using less energy and less advanced hardware.
“The number one factor that will define whether the United States or China wins this race is whose technology is most broadly adopted in the rest of the world,” said Brad Smith, Vice Chair and President of Microsoft Corporation. He argued that whoever creates a global network of trust in and access to their technology first will most likely win the AI race.
Washington Sen. Maria Cantwell, the top Democrat on the committee, suggested creating a “tech NATO” where the five democracies with the most sophisticated technology set rules and advisories on the technology supply chain and implementation. She emphasized the importance of creating international alliances in the technology sector.
While Democrats on the committee stressed the importance of protecting users and their intellectual property from AI through regulation, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, chairman of the committee, criticized strong regulation of AI.
Cruz said he would create a new bill “that creates a regulatory sandbox for AI modeled on the approach taken by Congress and President Clinton at the dawn of the internet.”
The Telecommunications Act of 1996, signed into law by Clinton, intended to promote competition and deregulate the tech industry.
“To lead in AI, the United States can not allow regulation, even the supposedly benign kind, to choke innovation or adoption,” Cruz said.
Several committee members emphasized the importance of the U.S. winning the AI race so that American values remain in high regard globally.
“We’re trying to win a race so that American values prevail internationally,” Sen. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, said.
Erin Drumm is a reporter for the Medill News Service covering politics. She graduated from the University of Notre Dame in 2024 with a BA in American Studies and is now a graduate student at Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism specializing in politics, policy and foreign affairs.
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American flag fractured into pieces
Getty Images: Rob Dobi
Democracy in Action: April Retrospective
May 10, 2025
Welcome to Democracy in Action, where you will find insights and a discussion with the Fulcrum's collaborators about some of the most talked-about topics.
Consistent with the Fulcrum's mission, this program strives to share many perspectives to widen our readers' viewpoints.
I spoke with these Fulcrum columnists about who controls knowledge, harming domestic violence survivors, and how Latinos are shifting religious and political preferences:
Leslie Virnelson, a Democracy Fellow with Interfaith America.
Robert Cropf, a professor of political science at Saint Louis University.
Payal Sinha, a distinguished attorney who serves as Director of Strategic Partnerships and Community Engagement at the Tahirih Justice Center.
In his column, “Why Harvard’s Fight Is Everyone’s,” Bob wrote: This is not just a fight over campus politics. It is a battle over the future of democratic governance—over who defines truth, who controls knowledge, and who prepares the next generation of civic leaders.
In the round table conversation, he said the Trump administration's freezing of $2.2 billion in federal funding to Harvard is "a sharp escalation designed to intimidate not just the school, but all of higher education. It shows that this is not about reform. It's about conquest."
In “New Law Will Likely Harm Immigrant Survivors of Domestic Violence,” Payal wrote: A tragic death sparked national attention, turning into a call to strengthen immigration enforcement to enhance public safety. However, she said many of the most vulnerable are at risk from the haphazardness with which the Trump administration is rolling out its agenda.
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"30 to 50% of immigrant women in the US experience domestic violence, which is a rate higher than the general population," she said. Referencing a national study, Payal explained that many "immigrant victims were afraid to report the abuse due to the fear of being deported."
In April, the Fulcrum published Leslie's “Christian Nationalism at the Nexus of Latinos’ Shifting Religious and Political Preferences.” She wrote about a study by the Public Religion Research Institute that shows that while support for Christian nationalism in the United States remained relatively steady between 2022 and 2024, Hispanic Protestants were the only group with a dramatic increase in support.
"Latinos are not a unified voting bloc. So often on the news, they're considered as just one unit or a monolith. (But) They're a huge and rapidly growing part of our electorate that brings a wide diversity of religious and political perspectives," Leslie said.
Check out the April round table discussion:
Hugo Balta is the executive editor of the Fulcrum and a board member of the Bridge Alliance Education Fund, the parent organization of The Fulcrum. He is the publisher of the Latino News Network and an accredited Solutions Journalism and Complicating the Narratives trainer with the Solutions Journalism Network.
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Crowd waving flags
(Mark Wilson/Getty Images)
The Next Hundred Days: America's Latest Test of Democracy
May 10, 2025
For decades, we have watched America wrestle with its demons. Sometimes, she has successfully pinned them down. Other times, the demons have slipped beyond her grasp. Yet, America has always remained in the ring. There is no difference right now, and the stakes couldn't be higher.
Across America, from small-town council meetings to state legislatures, there's a coordinated effort to roll back the clock on civil rights, geopolitical relations, and the global economy. It's not subtle, and it's not accidental. The targeting of immigrants and citizens of color has become so normalized that we risk becoming numb to it. For example, what happened in Springfield, Ohio, late last year? When national politicians started pushing rhetoric against Haitian immigrants, it wasn't just local politics at play. It was a test balloon, a preview of talking points soon echoed in halls of government and media outlets nationwide. Thus, this is how discrimination, intolerance, and blatant hate go mainstream or viral—it starts small, tests the waters, and spreads like a virus through our body politic and social system.
Sadly, I have studied and endured American politics long enough to recognize patterns, and this one's familiar. Every major stride toward equality in American history has faced pushback. After Reconstruction came Jim Crow. After the civil rights movement came the "law and order" era. After Obama's presidency, we all know what came next. However, the difference at this moment is that we are not fighting these battles with the weaponry of our parents and grandparents. Once again, the tools of discrimination have gone digital, but so have the tools of resistance.
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The next hundred days will set the trajectory for this fight, not because they'll end it, but because they'll determine how we fight it. We're at one of those inflection points where silence becomes complicity, and inaction becomes endorsement.
Consider all that has happened with voting rights, DEI, immigration, First Amendment action, and the dismantling of government infrastructure. We continue to see a tsunami of executive actions, legislation, and litigation that, while carefully worded to appear neutral, disproportionately affect minority communities. These aren't your grandfather's literacy tests—these are sophisticated administrative hurdles dressed up in the language of election and homeland security, patriotism, balanced budgets, and the Meritus playing field. The intent hasn't changed; only the packaging has.
The attacks on diversity aren't just targeting the ballot box. They're showing up in school board meetings where discussions of American history are being sanitized, in housing policies that maintain segregation through bureaucratic sleight-of-hand, and in immigration policies that seem designed to preserve a demographic status quo that's already long gone.
Still, hope abounds! We are witnessing and encouraging greater and more strategic resistance than ever before. This generation of activists isn't marching—they're running for office. Civil rights organizations aren't just filing lawsuits but building databases to track discrimination patterns. Community groups aren't just protesting—they're creating alternative institutions.
The old divide-and-conquer playbooks are still employed, but new obstacles are yet to arise. When politicians try to pit ethnic communities against immigrant communities or working-class whites against urban Black and Brown people, they're finding that these groups are often already connected through informal yet intricately comprised networks of social media, shared economic interests, and cross-cultural organizations.
Socially and civilly conscious engaged actors must remain clear about what we are against. The forces pushing discrimination have deep pockets and sophisticated strategies. They are not just working through obvious channels like legislation and court cases—they're shaping narratives through think tanks, creating echo chambers in media, and using data analytics to identify and exploit social divisions.
We acknowledge this era of activists has advantages our predecessors couldn't have imagined. When discriminatory incidents occur, they are shared instantly. When false narratives emerge, facts are immediately corrected. When communities need to mobilize, they can do so within hours instead of weeks. However, it lacks tools, capabilities, focus, and coordination. Too often, popular movements are reactive rather than proactive, responding to each new crisis instead of building longitudinal strategic power. Emergent leaders and activists need to think broader and longer-term. I dare suggest a few things to consider:
First, democratic institutions necessitate strengthening at every level of American society, for instance, paying as much attention to local and municipal electoral matters as presidential races. It means supporting local journalism that can expose and unmask the reality of the truth in our backyards. It means building civic organizations that can outlast election cycles.
Second, a reframe of the conversation about American identity must commence. The myth of America as a white nation isn't just historically inaccurate – it's dangerous. America's story has always been one of the uniquely diverse and other-ed nation people, even when that diversity wasn't acknowledged nor celebrated. Our strength comes from our ability to expand our definition of "we the people," not restrict it.
Third, it is crucial to recognize that this isn't just a moral fight—it's an economic and geopolitical one. In a global economy, diversity is a competitive advantage. Countries that welcome and embrace differences tend to be more innovative, adaptable, and influential on the world stage. When we allow discrimination to flourish, we're not just betraying our values—we're shooting ourselves in the foot.
The next hundred days won't determine the outcome of this struggle, but they will show us what "we, the people," are made of. Will we rise to meet this moment with the urgency it demands? Will we build the coalitions and institutions needed for lasting change? Will we finally learn that an attack on any American's rights is an attack on the American experiment itself? Only time will tell.
Rev. Dr. F. Willis Johnson is a spiritual entrepreneur, author, scholar-practioner whose leadership and strategies around social and racial justice issues are nationally recognized and applied.
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